Book of Intentions Progress

I seldom post works in progress, but this will likely be one of those projects that takes years to complete -- if it ever get there LOL The book cover just terrified me ... a little too much like sewing LOL This is the cover of my Book of Intentions from Lisa Engelbrecht's class. We adhered strips of fabric to fusible webbing; mine wasn't holding well, so I stitched each strip afterward and also stitched gathered tulle to the edges for a neater finish on my cover.

Soar with Eagles

This was the last collage page in my doodle book. You were to look through magazines for images that spoke to you that define health ... whatever kind of health that may be.

Doodle Dandelion

This is another page from our spiritual doodle book. This was a neat book. Everything is in a handwritten style instead of a typical typed font. We were to doodle a dandelion and add intuitive experiences we have had.

Mysical Moon Poetry

This is a page I did in the Spiritual Doodles book. It is intuitive poetry. You take about 15 minutes and write down phrases or words that pop into your head. Afterward, you arrange your phrases and thoughts into a poem. The instructions said it was perfectly fine to be nonsensical -- it is more about the emotion of the piece.

I like what I wrote and think it would be fun to do a page in a real art journal adding imagery.

More Class Homework

I am officially out of school for the term --- wooo hooo! My homework was long done, but I had a few more pieces from my success class I wanted to upload now that school is over. This is probably the only class I'll have in my academic career allowing that kind of freedom LOL

These are Academic Advantage tip cards. The teacher supplied large index cards and said we could alter them in whatever way we chose as long as we included our tips. Here I am showing the cover and the backs of 2 cards to show what my background looked like. I stained them with walnut ink, used Color Mists from Outside the Margins, and rubberstamped.

Doodle Pets

Here is another page in the doodle book. We were supposed to doodle every pet we've ever owned -- I've had a few too many to fit LOL

Homework Woes

Well this was kind of a drag. One of my classes was easy, but also hard in that there was a huge amount of work. This class was about creating professional and academic success. The teacher made it more of a personal discovery class -- to learn what your personal keys to success are. She more or less passed over the class text book. We used Sprititual Doodles & Mental Leapfrogs as a workbook for the term. This is a vey fun book overall, but some of the items were a little tougher than I was expecting.

We were to turn it in at the end of the term, so she could verify that we did the assignments -- but most of the class complained about this not being their cup of tea and she buckled and gave everyone a perfect score -- even though some had barely touched it. It just aggravated me, because I worked really hard to be sure I got all the assignments done; it gets under my skin that people who put little effort got the same grade as me after I gave it my best effort.

So anyway -- I am posting a few of my exercies out of the book. This assignment was to do a collage based on your dreams.

Vampyres

Here are some pages I did in a vampire-themed AB. I was realy excited about the challenge of working in a dark theme. I did my art first and then I couldn't figure out quite how to finish the pages off or how to come up with a storlyline that would explain the images. I ran across a site about a legendary vampire in Rhode Island named Mercy Brown, so I used her as inspiration. I added some new characters to tie in with the altered cabinet card I did. Here is the storyline I wrote to go along with my pages:

Mercy Brown was 19 when her physical body succumbed to consumption in 1892. She was buried in a crypt until the cold winter Rhode Island ground could thaw. How could her beloved daddy know that Frank and Steve Longstretch had given her everlasting life in the dark world of a vampire and that she had been sustaining herself on the blood of babes?

Mercy’s brother was also ailing from consumption … wasting away and growing weaker daily, as was most of the small rural community. The Brown family doctor approached Mercy’s father with his theory that his deceased wife or daughters were undead and responsible for bringing death to his doorstep. Fearful of losing his last child, George Brown agreed to have the three graves exhumed and inspected for signs that they had crossed over to the undead.
One can only imagine how distraught he must have been to learn that Mercy had turned in her grave in the above-ground crypt. Fresh blood in her heart confirmed the doctor’s theory. They acted quickly to burn her heart and put her vampiric soul to rest. Ashes from Mercy’s burnt heart were fed to her brother Edwin in an attempt to break her spell over him, but alas … it was too late.

Fruit and Flowers

This is my last calendar page for the RR. I had to drop due to school :(

London

Here is a page I did in the May calendar for the RR. It was a travel theme ... kind of a hard theme for me.

Altered Torso

Here is an altered torso I did for an art lottery. I felt kind of stumped about what to collage on there -- and I have a gazillion postage stamps so that 's what I used LOL

The black accents were added with a bubble printing technique at MHBA -- fun!

April Fairy

I did this page in early April -- when Colorado typically gets slammed with a winter storm. We did get lucky this year though LOL I was feeling nostalgic for spring -- we've moved straight into summer now though LOL

As luck would have it ... this also fits in with Theme Thursday.

Black and White Medley

I didn't have any great dreams for this page. I just made a neat background and wanted to play around with black and white images -- negative and positive and see what happened.

Fragmented Resonance

You can't really tell now ... but the bottom layer was a plastic shopping bag I melted to the page and then painted.

Lone Heart Grunge

And you just know I couldn't make it a month without doing at least one heart page LOL

Yankee Doodle Dandy

I totally lost my momentum with getting my jourmnal pages posted ... but here is a page I did in the April calendar ...

College Update

I don't think I have said much on my blog, but some of you know I went back to school to pursue a degree in the Information Technology field. I love art ... it is my passion, but not something I would ever want to beat myself up over trying to make money with. I do art for recreation and to fill my soul.

I love the IT stuff -- working with data. It's hard to describe, but I get such a charge when I can figure out what is broken with something. I met with my mentor today and he has been so supportive and so encouraging of me following at least part of his footsteps. And he was cracking me up. My academic advisor made a recommendation for what IT class to start with next term and my mentor was saying you could do a lot of damage in that programming language if you didn't know what you were doing -- not a good choice for an intro -- but he was cracking me up -- and the idea that things could go incredibly wrong or incredibly well I found appealing and adventurous LOL

I am so excited. I have As in my classes so far -- and I'm getting close to the finish line for this term, so it is looking like I will keep my As -- assuming I don't fall off the wagon or something ... but school is one of those things I always loved and I can't stand not doing my very best, so I don't foresee that happening.

After several weeks wondering if I would get an academic advsor, they finally assigned me one ... and not a moment too soon. I never got all my loose ends tied up before being propelled into classes. My admissions counselor was all about getting the sale -- getting it signed -- blah blah blah She had a really flippant attitude about my fears of not doing math for 20 years and everything that seemed to come out her mouth was either dishonest or disrespectful. My academic advisor has been really nice and I get to meet him in person tomorrow evening -- and he already assured me that I will not have to deal with admissions anymore --- wooo hoooo!

Homespun

This is an art journal page I did in response to a challenge on Created By Hand. I glued some striped scrim over a painted decorative paper. I just thought it was the coolest thing ever (and cheap) and wanted to use it LOL The name homespun just popped into my head :)

Hula or Homework?

Which is more fun ... to hula hoop or do homework? LOL I'm working on a research paper, so you know what my answer will be LOL

I'm struggling with all these journal pages and completing homework for college, so I printed one of my homework assignments on decorative paper for a background LOL

Anatomy of an Injury

This art journal page was inspired by a fall on my face LOL I haven't banged up my knees like this since I was a kid -- guess I was overdue. I fell on the street and banged the dickens out of my knees ... not to mention a horridly large bruise on my chin and a sprained wrist and hand.

My bruises are all gone now, but the tenderness in my knees, hand, and chin is taking a while to heal.

I found some clip-art anatomy of the affected areas for this page. I'm a little late, but thought this was appropriate for last week's Inspire Me Thursday prompt.